World Wine Statistics 2010

Statistics and other numbers for the world of wine in 2010: the planted vineyard acreage, the wine production, wine consumption, wine exports and imports. (A summary of previously published stats. Source for all: OIV)

World vineyard acreage in 2010

Global vineyard surface area shrunk in 2010 to 7.6 million hectares, loosing around 10,000 ha. The “old world” is still very dominant although the “New World have increased in importance, gaining just over nine percentage points over the period. Here’s the split:

• Europe: 57%
• Asia: 22%
• Americas: 13%
• Africa: 5%
• Oceania: 2.7%

The world wide vineyard acreage has been steadily declining since 2003 when it peaked at almost 7.9M ha. The big “losers” are the traditional big, old world wine countries: Spain, France, and Italy.

The 12 leading countries are:

1. Spain: 1082 Mha
2. France: 825 kha
3. Italy: 798 kha
4. Turkey: 505 kha
5. China: 490 kha
6. USA: 404 kha
7. Iran: 300 kha
8. Portugal: 243 kha
9. Argentina: 228 kha
10. Romania: 204 kha
11. Chile: 200 kha
12. Australia: 170 kha

As you can see, “vineyard area” really means “grape growing acreage” since some of the countries grow a lot of grapes but make little wine.

World wine production 2010

Just like vineyard acreage, world wine production shrunk in 2010. The total volume of wine produced in 2010 is estimated to be 263 million hectolitre, down from a bit over 270 Mhl in 2009.

Here’s the split on continents:

• Europe: 66%
• Amercias: 19%
• Asia: 5.5%
• Oceania: 5%
• Africa: 4%

The New World has gained 7% points on the old world over fifteen years. World wine production peaked in 2004 at just under 300 Mhl.

The 12 leading wine producing countries in 2010 were (“OIV forecast”):

1. Italy: 48.6 Mhl
2. France: 45.3 Mhl
3. Spain: 36.1 Mhl
4. USA: 19.6 Mhl
5. Argentina: 16.3 Mhl
6. China: 13 Mhl
7. Australia: 11.2 Mhl
8. South Africa: 9.2 Mhl
9. Chile: 8.8 Mhl
10. Russia: 8.2 Mhl
11. Germany: 7.2 Mhl
12. Portugal: 6.8 Mhl

It is interesting to note that China has moved up to the world’s 6th biggest wine producer. There is a lot of buzz around China as a wine buyer (a market for wine) but apparently it is also catching up on production. It has overtaken both Australia, South Africa and Chile.

Global wine consumption 2010

In contrast to global vineyard area and wine production, that declined, global wine consumption saw a slight increase in 2010, inching marginally up to 238 million hectolitres. World consumption peaked in 2007 at around 250 Mhl, declined substantially in 2008 and 2009. But this declined was stopped in 2010 when the consumption essentially levelled out.

The Old World is by far the biggest consumer, accounting for 65% of the total, but its importance have declined (7 percentage points over 15 years):

• Europe: 65%
• Americas: 22%
• Asia: 7.9%
• Africa: 2.9%
• Oceania: 2.7%

There are dramatic differences in consumer patterns in different parts of the world:

The traditional big producers and consumers have declining consumption: France, Italy and Spain have seen the consumption drop radically.

The big growth markets are the USA, China, Australia, Russia and (curiously) the UK (in the longer term).

The US passed Italy in 2006 (both countries drank 27 Mhl that year) and looks likely to overtake France as the biggest consumer if the trends continue.

Here are the top twelve countries:

1. France: 29.4 Mhl (trend: -)
2. USA: 27.1 Mhl (+)
3. Italy: 24.5 Mhl (-)
4. Germany 20.2 Mhl (+)
5. China: 14.3 Mhl (+)
6. UK: 13.2 Mhl (=/+)
7. Spain: 10.9 Mhl (-)
8. Argentina: 10 Mhl (-)
9. Russia: 9.7 Mhl (short term -, longer +)
10. Australia: 5.3 Mhl (+)
11. Portugal: 4.4 Mhl (-)
12. Canada: 4.4 Mhl (+)

World wine exports

It is in the world wine export numbers (international trade in wine) where you see the real boom. Wine is more and more consumed outside the country of production. There are two big drivers behind this: the big producers are consuming less wine domestically and thus have to export more. Secondly, there is a host of “new” wine producing countries that are becoming important wine producers but that have relatively modest local demand.

Lets look at some countries, looking back over the period 2002 to 2010:

Italy: has seen a steady growth, especially lately and is now the biggest exporter.

Spain: has also seen a substantial increase in exports (>+50%) over the period and has become the second exporter.

France: Used to be the biggest exporter but have seen a steady, but not dramatic, decline (-12% over the period) and has fallen to 3rd place.

After these there is a big group of countries that have seen very impressive growth in wine exports: Australia, Chile, USA, South Africa, Argentina, New Zealand and curiously even Germany.

The big loose in relative terms, in market share, is France, although in absolute numbers it has not shrunk all that much.

Here are the top twelve wine exporting countries 2010:

1. Italy: 20.6 Mhl (trend: +)
2. Spain: 17.1 Mhl (+)
3. France: 13.5 Mhl (-)
4. Australia:7.8 Mhl (+)
5. Chile: 7.3 Mhl (+)
6. USA: 4.1 Mhl (+)
7. South Africa: 3.9 Mhl (+)
8. Germany: 3.8 Mhl (+)
9. Argentina: 2.7 Mhl (+)
10. Portugal: 2.6 Mhl (-)
11. New Zealand: 1.4 Mhl (+)
12. Moldavia (!): 1 Mhl (-)

Wine imports 2010

Since wine exports are booming so is wine import. Over the period 1995 to 2010 it has increased from 48 million hl to almost the double: 87 Mhl. The wine buyers have been even more dominantly Old World: today 70% of wine imports are to European countries (including intra-Europe), down though from 83% in 1995.

Here are the top 14 countries:

1. Germany: 14.2 Mhl (trend ‘05-‘10: +)
2. UK: 12.5 Mhl (+)
3. USA: 9.3 Mhl (+)
4. Russia: 5.5 Mhl (-)
5. France: 4.5 Mhl (-)
6. Canada: 3.5 Mhl (+)
7. Netherlands: 3.3 Mhl (-)
8. Belgium: 3 Mhl (+)
9. China: 2.9 Mhl (+)
10. Japan: 2 Mhl (+)
11. Denmark: 2 Mhl (+)
12. Switzerland: 1.9 Mhl (+)
13. Italy: 1.7 Mhl (-)
14. Portugal: 1.6 Mhl (+)

It is perhaps surprising to find Germany at the top of the list, but it has been there for quite some time.

The big gains have been in the USA, Canada, and China. China is still (in 2010) modest in size, only in 9th position, but in percentage terms the growth has been very high, from almost nothing in 2002. If the trend continues (as many producers hope) it will rapidly climb up the chart.